November2015

Nov 1-4 Istachatta: Hot! Highs near 90 (32C) every day, with night time lows in the low 70s, just a few degrees below summer temps. The cool night time temps we had in Oct. were obviously unseasonal. No rain. Oak leaves are falling and the forest is thinning out, allowing more light and better visibility. Some citrus is starting to fruit. I never even saw the flowers, but I've started checking out the larger citrus trees every day. Time to get a pole lopper! Coyotes howling earlier than usual. Banana spiders starting to disappear, their webs falling into disrepair.

Nov 9, Taidong: Been away in Australia for a few weeks and arrived back to hot weather the same as it ever was. 30 plus, light winds, humid. Still need air con. Presumably because of El Nino effect, there doesn't seem to have been any meaningful dong bei ji fong this year. Pink flowering tree near entrance starting to bloom. Grass still growing fast. Big falls in early Dec. 60 mil over three days reported for Taidong but it must have been more here coz guage had 136 mil when i got back.

Nov 10, Istachatta: A 'cold' front has moved through and brought temperatures back into seasonal ranges. The next week or so looks great, with clear skies, highs in the low 80's (25-28) with lows in the low 60's (hi teens), then Sat a we have a forecast high of only 74 and a low of 53 (11). Pretty soon it will be time to fire up the fireplace. Fortunately we have central heating as well. It hits the single digits (C) here regularly and sometimes freezes.

Nov 15 Istachatta: We're experiencing perfect much weather now. Cool nights, warmish days, dry, and generally sunny. Nights are getting down to about 10-12C and daytime highs in the low 20s C. We can now walk or do yard work in the middle of the day without getting too hot. We saw a wild turkey the other day and I now realize a group of birds walking across the bike path in the distance that we saw a couple weeks ago were probably turkeys.

Nov 17 Taidong: Perfect summer weather here for the last two weeks - only problem is it's not meant to be still summer. Hitting 30+ nearly every day and still need air con on. Shorts and t-shirt at night. Only one day of strongish north easterlies. Typhoon forming in likely spot and with the weather this warm and stable it still feels like a typhoon here could be possible. Pink flower tree near entrance gate is blooming. Saw first autumn green firefly on my land though i saw them somewhere else a week ago.

Nov 30 Istachatta: Beautiful November. Locals are telling me it's a couple degrees above normal, but basically not much different than usual. Guess I won't have to replace those drafty windows after all.

Nov 30, Taidong: Ended up being the hottest Nov in the last 10 years and possibly a record. Lost track of the rainfall due to renovations but there was one big 100 mil rain event which would have put it above normal. Rain seemed to come from a storm moving in from the east and happened as traditional front from the north was on approach. Very little hornet activity that i noticed. Green fireflies going strong. First ripe tomatoes though from struggling plants - planted early as an experiment but didn't really work - most plants succumbing to disease due to hot Oct-Nov. Around end of Nov the first cold surge came through - usually happens around mid nov.